According to the European Court for Human Rights, as of the end of last year it had nearly 120,000 pending cases and 28% of them, a shocking total of over 33,000 cases, had been filed by Russians.  The next-highest contributor of cases to the ECHR docket was Turkey, with three times fewer matters contributed than Russia. Russia has only twice Turkey’s population, which means that pound for pound Russia generates one-third more human rights atrocities than the second-worst offender in the world even when judged on a per capita basis.

Of course, when Russians talk economics, they don’t talk “per capita,” they talk national statistics. When Vladimir Putin wants to brag about Russia being one of the top 10 economies in the world, he never stops to mention Russia’s woeful level of economic performance when judges per capita. Then, Russia does not appear in the top 50.

A civilized nation, of course, would not seek to rationalize or justify finding itself the very most horrific contributor of human rights atrocities to the ECHR.  A civilized nation would immediately address itself to reform.  But Russia, of course, isn’t the least bit civilized, and that’s why its state-sponsored propaganda network Russia Today didn’t say a word about the need for reform when it reported these shocking statistics, and instead fell all over itself seeking to rationalize and ignore them.

We continue to be appalled at Russia’s pathological refusal to accept its own shortcomings and its furious, suicidal refusal to even consider reform.  We continue to believe that so-called “friends” like Russia Today, who work fervently to cover up Russia’s faults rather than to work hard to reform them, are Russia’s true enemies.  Such as they are responsible for allowing both the institution of the Tsar and the institution of the Politburo to become like the infamous Emperor with is “new clothes” until they quite literally freeze themselves into oblivion and collapse.

It’s not a pretty sight.